You know what that means: higher heating oil and natural gas bills and a gas tax!

Oh, but don’t you worry! We’re gonna get all of it back in a rebate, wink, wink.

This carbon tax will add 36 cents to a gallon of gasoline and who knows how much for a gallon of heating oil or a btu of natural gas.

Who pays? Home owners, anyone that has to drive to work, and anyone who buys a gallon of gasoline or diesel fuel that doesn’t live in Taxachusetts.

Who gets the rebate? Residents, with “special attention to the names and addresses of low-income residents,” and employers in Massachusetts with special attention to those economic sectors and sub-sectors at risk for serious negative impacts of the carbon tax.

The catch: residents who don’t own a home or drive a car get the same rebate as everyone else and the employer rebates are based on the number of employees of an employer.

Also the bill allows the State to give all of the employer rebates to employers in those economic sectors or sub-sectors that will be hardest hit, however that will be determined. (I wonder what sectors or sub-sectors those will be!)

Oh, yeah, and one more thing: the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is considered an employer! So the Commonwealth will get a rebate! Hmmm. I wonder what they’ll do with money?

So what does this have to with the environment? Nothing! But it has everything to do with transferring money from hardworking families trying to earn a living to those who don’t.

While the bill doesn’t stand a chance at passage, it’s worth noting where the liberal wing is headed. The list of sponsors of this bill is the who’s who of the liberal Democrats on Beacon Hill. One liberal Democrat that would support this if he got a chance would be Rep. Mike Brady (D-Brockton) running in a special election for State Senate.